There are assuredly complicated and troublesome questions in politics; but it never occurred to me that whether we should provide weapons for the slaughter of children, was one of them. In a slight, yet perceptible, movement toward something like sanity and reason, the foreign secretary, Mr David Lammy, last week announced that thirty arms export licences to Israel are suspended. Cries of rage and disappointment issued from the expected quarters: Benjamin Netanyahu, Labour Friends of Israel, the Board of Deputies, and others we do not care to name; but these remonstrances conceal the extent to which the government remains a collaborator of Israel, and therefore an accomplice in Israel’s crimes. This measure, with its mixture of a small concession to justice, and the refusal to do all that justice demands, is a good example of the see-saw: the expedient that politicians employ, when they desire to satisfy different groups, whose interests are incompatible.
In the first place, the measure only cancelled a very small proportion of arms export licences: 30 from a total of 350. From this, the plan to be pursued is obvious enough: when Mr Lammy meets a constituent who opposes Israel’s onslaught, the constituent shall be told that the government has taken appropriate action by ending the 30 licences; when Mr Lammy meets a constituent who finds Israel’s onslaught to be a model of proportionate self-defence, Mr Lammy shall say that there is nothing to fear, since 320 export licences remain. Thus the see-saw alternates. It is no doubt hoped that our overseers in Washington will tolerate this deviation from their will, so long as it remains within acceptable limits, which a complete arms embargo would be likely to exceed. But let us view the question from the vantage point of morals—if our readers will forgive us such an exotic and rare proceeding. There is unanimity among all those institutions tasked with the defence of human rights, and the documentation of war crimes, that Israel’s actions in Gaza have constituted a long and egregious string of atrocities. The siege is a crime; the indiscriminate bombardment is a crime; the torture and ill-treatment of detainees is a crime; all which are taking place on a vast scale, and inflicting terror beyond what most of us are capable of imagining. That we should supply even a single weapon for this barbarous campaign should shame us, and if we belonged to a more advanced civilization, we would not hesitate to prosecute and punish the responsible functionaries, regardless of whether their title is “prime minister”, or “Sir”, or “Lord”. All arms export licences to Israel should be cancelled without delay.
The government also continues to collaborate with Israel by means besides arms exports. We know that the Tory ministry supported Israel with Royal Air Force surveillance flights; we know that the RAF Akrotiri base at Cyprus has been used to support Israel’s military operations: what will be done? Mr Lammy gave us an indication of this during the debate in the House of Commons: when asked about the aforementioned points by Jeremy Corbyn MP, Mr Lammy said he would not comment on “operational issues”. In other words, nothing will be done; and we may presume that such military collaboration will continue, even as the government recognises the “clear risk” that Israel could breach international law. It is evident, then, that the government has not done the minimum simply to avoid complicity in the crimes—simply not to aid and abet them: we have not even approached our real obligation, which is to exert our best efforts to terminate the crimes, by imposing sanctions, applying diplomatic pressure, and pursuing all legal means that might palliate the sufferings of the people of Gaza. It must always be remembered that Israel did not begin to violate moral and legal principles in 2024: it has been an incorrigible criminal state, seizing land that does not belong to it, and governing by a system of racial supremacy, for many years. It is long past time for the British government to cut ties with this disgraceful regime; but I suspect that Sir Keir Starmer will do no such thing, being himself an ardent “friend of Israel”, who does not believe that Palestinians live under apartheid.
We have next to consider the mode in which Mr Lammy defended the measure; and it is a very sorry picture to describe. His speech consisted of apologetic cringing before Israel’s supporters, with a rather bare and perfunctory acknowledgement of what has been done to Gaza over the last eleven months. Mr Lammy resembled no one so closely as a concerned mother, who, finding her child reluctant to take its medicine, sugars the bitter pill, and whispers consoling words into the youngster’s ears. I quote from Mr Lammy’s speech of 2 September:
“Our common goal of peace in the middle east will never be lasting until there is safety, security and sovereignty for both Israel and a Palestinian state. We must all keep at the forefront of our mind the pain, the anguish and the horror this conflict has caused for so many ordinary civilians. The victims of the 7 October atrocity. The hostages and all those still enduring unimaginable suffering, whether they are hoping to see their loved ones again or are mourning their loss, as the tragic events of this weekend illustrate with the recovery of the bodies of six murdered hostages. The Israeli people still living under rocket fire, not only from Hamas but from other hostile actors explicitly dedicated to Israel’s annihilation, and fighting an enemy in Hamas whose appalling tactics endanger countless civilian lives. And the innocent Palestinians, with tens of thousands killed in the fighting, their numbers growing by the day, including distressing numbers of women and children. Many mothers are so malnourished that they cannot produce milk for their babies, and families are struggling to keep their children alive—disease and famine loom ever larger.”
Here is the see-saw once again: Mr Lammy puts the sufferings of the Israelis and Palestinians together, and thus hopes to demonstrate his equal regard for both groups, except he could not help using very different language to describe the relevant facts. The 7 October attack was an “atrocity”; Israelis face enemies who are “explicitly dedicated to Israel’s annihilation”; Hamas uses “appalling tactics” that endanger civilians: Mr Lammy is content to use his whole vocabulary of reprobation to describe the acts of the official enemies, Hamas and Iran. We are left in not the smallest doubt, that the actions of these enemies are criminal. But what of the Palestinians, who have been massacred in far larger numbers? We are told that they have been “killed in the fighting”, and that this is “distressing”; that “disease and famine loom”, because of some mysterious agent—perhaps an evil spirit; there is no language implying criminality, no suggestion of the wilful ravage of Gaza, no hint of the genocidal pronouncements of Israel’s leaders. We are apt to conclude, from Mr Lammy’s account, that the people of Gaza are not the victims of any act of volition—his description is well-fitted to an eleven-month accident, where Israel unleashed its bombs and missiles and tanks upon Gaza all by a rather absent-minded mistake.
Mr Lammy, after rehearsing his lifelong support for Israel, and calling (as all British governments do, without the least thought of action) for a two-state solution, proceeds to set forth the results of the review of arms exports to Israel:
“Let me first be clear on the review’s scope. This Government are not an international court. We have not, and could not, arbitrate on whether or not Israel has breached international humanitarian law. This is a forward-looking evaluation, not a determination of innocence or guilt, and it does not prejudge any future determinations by the competent courts.”
It is perplexing to be told that “This Government are not an international court” after reading the earlier part of Mr Lammy’s speech. Did he not accuse Hamas of “atrocity”? Why, then, is it permissible to reach a judgment affirming the criminality of the official enemy, but not Israel? It assuredly cannot be for want of evidence: the reports of Israel’s atrocities are voluminous. It is the see-saw again: perhaps Israel has done wrong, but it is not so bad as our official enemies. Then comes Mr Lammy’s tragic climax:
“It is with regret that I inform the House today that the assessment I have received leaves me unable to conclude anything other than that, for certain UK arms exports to Israel, there exists a clear risk that they might be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law.”
Alas! It rends the foreign secretary’s heart to have to take this step: every cell of his “progressive Zionist” body revolts against the suspension of arms sales; yet he had to yield to the force of the law. Mr Lammy continues:
“Israel’s actions in Gaza continue to lead to immense loss of civilian life, widespread destruction to civilian infrastructure and immense suffering. In many cases, it has not been possible to reach a determinative conclusion on allegations regarding Israel’s conduct of hostilities, in part because there is insufficient information either from Israel or other reliable sources to verify such claims. Nevertheless, it is the assessment of His Majesty’s Government that Israel could reasonably do more to ensure that lifesaving food and medical supplies reach civilians in Gaza, in the light of the appalling humanitarian situation.”
Here we have the first imputation of responsibility to Israel: the “immense loss of civilian life” is not said to be a crime: but at least the agent of the destruction is identified. Mr Lammy spoils this promising acknowledgment of fact in the very next sentence: there is, “In many cases”, “insufficient information” to determine whether Israel has conducted hostilities in accordance with international law. I do not know what these “many” ambiguous cases are, and Mr Lammy is too miserly to mention even one; yet by now we have all heard of clear examples of unquestionable criminal conduct on the part of Israel. It is a shame that our foreign secretary lacks access to the internet, which would enable him to read the South African application to the International Court of Justice, wherein the barbarity of Israel’s campaign is expounded at length. Yes, if Mr Lammy had a search engine at his disposal, he would doubtless find the request for arrest warrants made by the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, which accuses Benjamin Netanyahu of starving Palestinian civilians; and then Mr Lammy would know that there is, in a great number of cases, sufficient information to verify that Israel is conducting itself dreadfully, from “reliable sources” including the UN and all major humanitarian bodies.
The rest of the speech forms an apology to Israel. Mr Lammy repeats—without, of course, making a legal judgment, because the government is not a court—that “there can be no doubt that Hamas pay not the slightest heed to international humanitarian law and endanger civilians by embedding themselves in the tightly concentrated civilian population and in civilian infrastructure. There is no equivalence between Hamas terrorists—or indeed Iran and its partners and proxies—and Israel’s democratic Government, but to license arms exports to Israel we must assess its compliance with international humanitarian law, notwithstanding the abhorrence of its opponents’ tactics and ideology.” I must once again confess my perplexity: if Hamas are “terrorists” because of the innocents they have killed, how could the Israeli government and its army, which have killed countless more innocents during this campaign than Hamas has killed in its entire career, not be much more deplorable terrorists? It would be most advantageous if Mr Lammy laid before us his preferred definition of terrorism, so that we might understand his reasoning; for in the absence of clarification, I am afraid that Mr Lammy’s view amounts to this: the acts of our enemies are terrorism; the acts of our allies are not. The reference to “Israel’s democratic Government” is not less strange: Israel rules over an occupied population of millions, who have no voting rights or citizenship: this error, I suppose, we must attribute to the total incapacity of the Foreign Office to do the most elementary research; otherwise, Mr Lammy would have been made aware of this notorious fact. But allowing that Israel is a democracy for its Jewish population, it is incomprehensible what sort of consolation that is supposed to be. The widow and the orphan gain no reprieve from their misery, by contemplating that their loved ones were murdered on the orders of democratically elected functionaries. I doubt that the Vietnamese villagers burned by napalm found their deaths more pleasant, because the American democracy targeted them; and I doubt that the inhabitants of Melos, when their men were executed, and their women and children sold into slavery, thought their fate was very tolerable, since it was decided by the democratic Athenians. No, when “democratic” states perpetrate such crimes, they must be regarded as proportionally more depraved than despotic states, because the liberties of the democratic citizenry have not been employed to check the government’s abuses.
Mr Lammy winds up his remarks with notices that this is not a full arms embargo, that this position will continue to be reviewed, and that “This Government will continue to stand up for Israel’s security”. It remains for us to consider why the government decided that it should suspend the small proportion of arms licences included in this measure.
First, the success of pro-Palestine candidates at the last election has given the Labour Party a fright: two would-be Labour ministers were deprived of their seats, and others came very close to the same end. The government has felt, therefore, that it should make some concession to these unhappy voters; that it should employ the see-saw, with a view of reducing such discontent. The Palestinian cause, it should ever be remembered, is a truly popular one in this country. It is also to be observed, that imposing political punishments on the Oligarchy, by electing principled members of Parliament, is indispensable as a means of improving government policy.
Second, it is likely that growing vexation in the civil service contributed to the present result: the individuals who manage the state from within, are mostly perspicacious enough to see that Israel is guilty of war crimes, and would much prefer that they are not accomplices. One experienced civil servant, Mark Smith, resigned from the Foreign Office in August in consequence of this; and it is assuredly plausible that many others felt the same.
Third, there is the government’s own fear of legal repercussions: in the unlikely circumstance that ministers are ever brought to account for their role in this horror, it will be rather useful to them to be able to cite a small measure taken against Israel. Thus the see-saw has multiple applications.
Notes in the Margins of the Days 